THE PERMEABILITY OF CLASS BOUNDARIES TO INTERGENERATIONAL MOBILITY AMONG MEN IN THE UNITED-STATES, CANADA, NORWAY AND SWEDEN

We explore the differential permeability of three class boundaries-the boundaries determined by property, authority and expertise-to intergenerational mobility among men in four developed capitalist economies: the United States, Canada, Norway and Sweden. We conclude: (1) In all four countries, the authority boundary is the most permeable to intergenerational mobility; (2) in the two North American countries, the patterns of permeability of class boundaries are broadly consistent with the expectations of neo-Marxist conceptualizations of class-the property boundary is the least permeable, followed by the expertise boundary, and then the authority boundary; (3) in the two Scandinavian countries, especially in Sweden, the property and expertise boundaries do not differ significantly in their degree of permeability; (4) the class boundary between workers and capitalists is less permeable than would be predicted from a strictly additive model of the permeability of the three dimensions of the class structure (property + authority + expertise); and (5) in the United States and Canada, the patterns of class boundary permeability to mobility are similar to the patterns of permeability to friendship and cross-class marriages, while mobility patterns in Norway and Sweden differ from friendship and marriage patterns.